By Larry Fitzmaurice on June 20, 2011 at 3:45 p.m. EDT

-- New Jersey/NYC-based shoegazers Big Troubles have signed to venerable indie Slumberland. The band will release a new single, "Sad Girls" b/w "Phantom", on August 30. The single's taken from Romantic Comedy, their forthcoming full-length follow-up to last year's Worry.

-- The glitzy indie rockers once known as Lights have changed their name to the slightly more Google-friendly Cliffie Swan. They'll release their new album, Memories Come True, June 21 via Drag City. Download the track "So Long" here.

-- Folksy indie rock vets Centro-matic will self-release their tenth full-length, Candidate Waltz, June 21 (Thirty Tigers/RED will provide distribution). The band also has a summer tour planned with Sarah Jaffe; check out those dates here.

-- Portland indie rock duo Viva Voce have signed to Vanguard Records; their debut for that label, The Future Will Destroy You, comes out June 21. Grab a song from that release, "Analog Woodlands Song", here.

By Tom Breihan on June 4, 2010 at 4:30 p.m. EDT

Kevin and Anita Robinson are the two members of Portland duo Viva Voce, and now the two of them have a new folk band, Blue Giant. The group also features Decemberists guitarist Chris Funk as well as members of Swords and the Golden Bears. On "Gone for Good", the song streaming above, it also features once and hopefully future Sleater-Kinney leader Corin Tucker.

By Tom Breihan on February 20, 2009 at 8:35 a.m. EST

-- According to MTV, Lil Wayne has pushed back the release of his terrible-idea rock album Rebirth (which my Pitchfork News colleague Ryan Dombal inexplicably believes will be good) to May 19. Here's hoping he just goes ahead and pushes it back to Never.

-- Next month, button-cute axe-wrecker Marnie Stern will tour the U.S., so here's your chance to chicken out of going up to her kissing booth and then kick yourself over it for weeks afterward.

-- The Hold Steady tend to drink a lot, which means keyboardist Franz Nicolay's tolerance should be in pretty good shape for when he opens for the reunited Pogues at New York's Roseland on March 13. Still, he should probably wear one of those medical-alert bracelets. I'm drunk just thinking about it. Nicolay will also play solo sets at the Delancy's Small Beast night every Thursday for the next three weeks, as he fills in for regular curator Paul Wallfisch while Wallfisch is on tour.

-- 90s electronica doofuses the Crystal Method, who had exactly one really good song more than 10 years ago, will attempt to capitalize on the whole crystal-name trend when Tiny e Records releases their album Divided By Night on May 12. The hilariously titled first single "Drown in the Now" features (yikes) Matisyahu. Other guests: New Order's Peter Hook; Ex-Grandaddy dude Jason Lytle; Metric's Emily Haines; and, in a move that makes all too much sense, Justin Warfield.

-- The weirdly underrated Portland narco-rock duo Viva Voce have added two more members to their lineup, and they've also got another album on the way. Barsuk will releas Rose City, the band's fourth LP, on May 26. So, uh, start paying attention to them.